The duties of an asylum superintendent

A RECENT number of the Portadown News (May 19th) contains an account of the monthly meeting of the Board of Management of the Lunatic Asylum at Portadown, at which various opinions were expressed by the members concerning what they conceived should be the duties of a medical superintendent. Among such duties - in addition to the professional duties - expected of the medical superintendent appeared the following: keeping the subsidiary financial account of the institution, the care and supervision of china and crockery, and the planting of potatoes. The question of acquiring additional land was negatived [sic] as the committee were unanimously of opinion - considering that Mr G. R. Lawless (the resident medical superintendent) did not know when potatoes should be planted - that there was no need of additional land. Among other things which fell within the medical superintendent's province was the selling of old clothes belonging to the patients as ordered by the board, though he (the medical superintendent) was of opinion that such clothes should be destroyed. On the motion of Mr Best, seconded by Mr Armstrong, “the board further instructed the medical superintendent to have mortar made on the grounds,” and to keep a supply of the same for the needs of the institution. A member of the committee inquired if they could feed more pigs than they had at present and Mr Lawless replied that they had not accommodation for more. The Portadown News concludes its report as follows concerning the committee and their doings: “ After the meeting was over several of the governors visited the piggeries, and on finding that a number of them (the pigs) were over two hundredweight and that in the ordinary course it would be two months before they could be disposed of by tender, it is said that some unprintable expressions were used regarding the management of the institution in general.” It appears clear that the medical and professional duties required to be performed by the medical superintendent as the responsible physician in charge of the patients and of the administration of the asylum could not be performed were he to have to do the other work required by the committee. Evidently some of the committee think that the superintendent should be made a beast of burden and a jack-of-all trades - a state of things which is not conducive to the best interests of the public asylum service if a medical officer in charge of patients is required to do the work of a steward, an accountant-clerk, a farm-bailiff, a housekeeper, and a manager of the piggeries.